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Skills
Skills Summary Your character’s skills represent a variety of abilities, and you get better at them as you go up in level. A skill check takes into account your training (trained skill bonus), natural talent (ability modifier), and luck (the die roll). It may also take into account your species’ knack for certain skills or the armor you’re wearing (armor check penalty), among other things. Trained Skills vs. Untrained Skills When you make a character, you are allowed to select a number of skills as trained skills. Your character receives a number of trained skills based on his or her character class and Intelligence modifier (minimum of 1 trained skill). Trained skills are selected from the character’s list of class skills at 1st level, and a character may acquire new trained skills by taking the Skill Training feat. The major difference between a trained skill and an untrained skill is that you gain a +5 bonus on skill checks if you’re trained in the skill. However, some skills (such as Use the Force) can’t be used untrained. Using Skills To make a skill check, roll: 1d20 + one-half your character level + key ability modifier + miscellaneous modifiers If you are trained in the skill, add +5 to the skill check result. A skill check is made just like an attack roll or a saving throw. The higher the roll, the better. You’re either trying to get a result that equals or exceeds a certain Difficulty Class (DC), or you’re trying to beat another character’s check result. For instance, to sneak quietly past a guard, Deel needs to beat the guard’s Perception check with a Stealth check. When adding “one-half your character level,” always round down (a 1st-level character adds +0). The “key ability modifier” is the character’s bonus or penalty for the skill’s associated ability (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma). “Miscellaneous modifiers” include armor check penalties and bonuses provided by talents, feats, or equipment. Some skills can’t be used untrained. If your character is not trained in these particular skills, you are not allowed to make any kind of check with them. How Do Skills Work? A character begins play with a number of trained skills based on his or her starting heroic class (Jedi, noble, scoundrel, scout, or soldier) and Intelligence modifier. A character must choose his or her trained skills from a larger list of class skills. For example, Rorworr (a 1st-level Wookiee scout) gets 5 trained skills for being a scout. Since his Intelligence score is 12, he gets 1 additional trained skill, for a total of 6 trained skills. These skills must be selected from the scout’s list of class skills. Rorworr selects Climb, Initiative, Mechanics, Perception, Pilot, and Stealth as his trained skills. Making Skill Checks When your character makes a skill check, roll 1d20 and add one-half your character level + your key ability modifier + any miscellaneous modifiers + 5 (if the character is trained in the skill). Success depends on the difficulty of the task at hand. Example: Rorworr, a 1st-level Wookiee scout with an Intelligence of 12, tries to open the lock on an Imperial detention cell to free an imprisoned Rebel operative. First he attempts a Mechanics check. Rorworr is trained in the skill, so he can attempt the check (Mechanics skill checks cannot be made untrained). He rolls 1d20 and adds one-half his level (+0), his Intelligence modifier (+1), and his trained skill bonus (+5). He gets a 13. Unfortunately, the GM knows that the lock on the cell door has a DC of 15. Having failed his check and pressed for time, Rorworr shoots the lock with his blaster. Advancing Skills Since a character’s skill modifiers are based on character level, they automatically increase as the character gains levels. When a character reaches 2nd level, all of his skill modifiers – in both trained and untrained skills – increase by 1. A character’s skill modifiers can also be increased by other means. Types of Skill Checks When you use a skill, you make a skill check to see how well you do. The higher the result on your skill check, the better you do. Based on the circumstances, your result must equal or exceed a particular number (a DC or the result of an opposed skill check) for you to use the skill successfully. The harder the task, the higher the number you need to roll. Circumstances can affect your check. If you’re free to work without distractions, you can make a careful attempt and avoid simple mistakes. If you have lots of time, you can try over and over again, assuming that you eventually succeed. If others help you, you may succeed where otherwise you would fail. Opposed Check Some skill checks are opposed checks. They are made against a randomized number, usually another character’s skill check result. For example, to sneak up on a guard, you need to beat the guard’s Perception check result with your Stealth check result. You make a Stealth check, and the GM makes a Perception check for the guard. Whoever scores the higher result wins the contest. For ties on opposed checks, the character with the higher skill modifier wins. For instance, if a Stealth check opposed by a Perception check results in a tie, the sneaker’s Stealth check modifier would be compared to the noticer’s Perception check modifier. If those scores are the same, roll again. Check Against a Difficulty Class (DC) Some checks are made against a Difficulty Class (DC). The DC is a number set by the GM (using the skill rules as a guideline) that you must score as a result on your skill check to succeed. For example, climbing the outer wall of a ruined warehouse may have a DC of 15. To climb the wall, you must get a result of 15 or better on a Climb check. Untrained Checks Some skills can be used only if you are trained in the skill. If you don’t have Use the Force, for example, regardless of your class, ability scores, and experience level, you just don’t know enough about using the Force to attempt to manipulate it consciously. Trying Again In general, you can try a skill check again if you fail, and you can keep trying indefinitely. Many skills, however, have natural consequences for failing that must be accounted for. Some skills can’t be tried again once a check has failed for a particular task. For most skills, when a character has succeeded at a given task, additional successes are meaningless. For example, if Deel Surool misses a Mechanics check to open a mechanical lock, he can try again and keep trying. If, however, an alarm sounds when the Mechanics check is missed by 5 or more, then failing has its own penalty. Similarly, if Rorworr misses a Climb check, he can keep trying, but if he misses by 5 or more, he falls (after which he can get up and try again if the fall wasn’t too far or too painful). If a skill carries no penalty for failure, you can take 20 and assume that you keep trying until you eventually succeed. Rerolling Some species traits, talents, and other special abilities allow you to reroll a skill check. You must declare that you are using this option immediately after making the check but before any effects are resolved. Furthermore, you must accept the result of the reroll, even if it is worse. For all purposes, the result of the reroll is treated as the real result of your skill check. Keeping the Better Result: Some species traits, talents, and other special abilities are more flexible, allowing you to reroll but keep the better of the two results. In most cases, this is more restricted and only available a limited number of times per day or requires you to spend a Force Point. As always, you must declare that you are using this option immediately after making the check but before any effects are resolved. Multiple Rerolls: Sometimes you have more than one species trait, talent, or other special ability that allows you to reroll the same skill check. In this case, you may choose to take each reroll one at a time in whatever order you wish, resolving each one before deciding whether to use another. For example, a Cerean scoundrel makes an Initiative check. Dissatisfied with the result, he decides to use the Cerean species trait that allows him to reroll his Initiative check, keeping the new result. Unfortunately, the second roll is even worse, so he decides to use the Knack talent to reroll one more time, this time keeping the better of the second and third rolls. Alternatively, he could have opted to use Knack first, keeping the better of the first and second rolls, and then (if necessary) use his Cerean species trait to roll a third time, keeping the third result instead of the better of the first two. Favorable and Unfavorable Circumstances Some situations may make a skill easier or harder to use, resulting in a bonus or penalty to the skill modifier for the skill check, or a change to the skill check’s DC. It’s one thing for Kelko, a Rodian scout, to hunt down enough food to eat while he’s camping for the day on the forest moon of Endor, using a Survival check. Foraging for food while crossing 100 kilometers of Tatooine’s Jundland Wastes is an entirely different matter. The GM can alter the odds of success in four ways to take into account exceptional circumstances: Give the skill user a +2 circumstance bonus to represent circumstances that improve performance, such as having the perfect tool for the job, getting help from another character, or processing unusually accurate information. Give the skill user a -2 circumstance penalty to represent circumstances that hamper performance, such as being forced to use improvised tools or possessing misleading information. Reduce the DC by 2 (or assign penalties to an opposed check) to represent circumstances that make the task easier, such as having a friendly audience or performing work that doesn’t have to be perfect. Increase the DC by 2 (or add bonuses to an opposed check) to represent circumstance that make the task harder, such as having a hostile audience or performing work that must be flawless. Circumstances that affect your ability to perform the skill change your skill modifier. Circumstances that modify how well you have to perform the skill to succeed change the DC. A bonus on your skill modifier and a reduction in the check’s DC have the same result - they create a better chance that you will succeed. But they represent different circumstances, and sometimes that difference is important. For example, Deel Surool the Twi’lek scoundrel wants to befriend a group of Trandoshan thugs drinking in a cantina. Before beginning his performance, Deel listens to the Trandoshans so that he can judge their mood. Doing so improves his chances to taking the right approach when introducing himself, giving him a +2 bonus to the skill modifier for his Persuasion check. The Trandoshans are in a good mood because they have recently received a sizable payoff, so the GM reduces the bonus they receive for an indifferent to +0. (Deel’s attempt at Diplomacy isn’t better just because the Trandoshans are in a good mood, so he does not get a bonus to add into his skill modifier.) However, the leader of the gang, a Human bounty hunter, has been unable to locate the Wookiee he’s tracking, and he’s suspicious of Deel. (Didn’t the datafile suggest the Wookiee was often seen in the company of a Twi’lek?) He gains a +2 bonus on his Will Defense to resist being persuaded (in addition to the normal +2 for being indifferent). Deel rolls a 6 and adds +8 for his skill modifier (including +2 for his impromptu research). His result is 14. The Trandoshans have a Will Defense of 13, so Deel’s skill check result is high enough to shift their attitudes to friendly, but not their leader (Will Defense 16). The Trandoshans applaud Deel Surool and offer to buy him drinks, but their leader eyes him suspiciously. Time and Skill Checks A skill’s description tells you whether using a skill is a standard action, a move action, a swift action, a full-round action, or a free action. Some skills can take minutes or hours to use. In general, using a skill that requires concentration (and thus distracts you from being fully aware of what’s going on around you) provokes an attack of opportunity from an opponent if you are within that opponent’s threatened area when you attempt the skill check. Checks Without Rolls A skill check represents an attempt to accomplish some goal, usually in the face of some sort of time pressure or distraction. Sometimes, though, you can use a skill under more favorable circumstances and eliminate the luck factor. Taking 10 When you’re not in a rush and not being threatened or distracted, you may choose to take 10. Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, calculate your result as if you had rolled a 10 (an average roll on a d20). For many relatively routine tasks, taking 10 results in a success. Distractions, threats, and danger make it impossible for a character to take 10. You also can’t take 10 when using a skill untrained, though the GM may allow exceptions for truly routine activities. Example: Rorworr the Wookiee has a Climb skill modifier of +10. The steep, rocky slope he’s climbing has a DC of 15. With a little care, he can take 10 and succeed automatically. But partway up the slope, a bounty hunter begins taking blaster shots at him from up above. Rorworr needs to make a Climb check to reach the bounty hunter, and this time he can’t take 10. He must make the skill check normally while under attack. Taking 20 When you have plenty of time (generally 2 minutes for a skill that can normally be checked in 1 round), and when the skill being attempted carries no penalty for failure, you can take 20. Taking 20 represents making multiple rolls, assuming that eventually you will roll a 20. Instead of rolling 1d20 for the skill check, calculate the result as if you had rolled a 20. Taking 20 means you keep trying until you get it right. Taking 20 takes twenty times as long as making a single check. Example: Rorworr comes to a cliff face. He takes 10 to make the climb, for a result of 20 (10 plus his + 10 skill modifier). However, the DC is 23, and the GM tells him that he fails to make progress up the cliff. (His check result is at least high enough that he doesn’t fall.) Rorworr can’t take 20 because there is a penalty associated with failure (falling, in this case). Later, Rorworr finds a small bunker in the Cliffside and searches it. The GM notes in the Perception skill description that each 1-square area takes a full-round action to search (and she secretly assigns a DC of 15 to the attempt). She estimates that the floors, walls, and ceiling of the bunker make up about twenty squares (about 45 square meters), so she tells Rorworr’s player that it takes 2 minutes to search the whole bunker. Rorworr rolls 1d20 and adds his +5 skill modifier. The result of 11 fails. Now Rorworr declares that he is going to search the bunker high and low, for as long as it takes. The GM takes the original time of 2 minutes and multiplies it by 20, for a result of 25. That’s more than enough to beat the DC of 15, and Rorworr finds a datapad discarded in a waste disposal unit. Combining Skill Attempts When more than one character tries the same skill at the same time and for the same purpose, their efforts may overlap. Individual Events Often, several characters attempt some action, and each succeeds or fails on his or her own. For example, Rorworr and each of his companions need to climb a slope to get to the top. Regardless of Rorworr’s result, the other characters need successful checks, too. Every character makes a skill check. Cooperation Sometimes the individual heroes react to the same circumstance, and they can work together to help each other out. In this case, one hero is considered the leader of the effort and makes a skill check while each helper makes a skill check against DC 10. (You can’t take 10 on this check.) For each helper who succeeds, the leader gets +2 circumstance bonus (as per the rule for favorable circumstances). In many cases, a character’s help won’t be beneficial, or only a limited number of characters can help at the same time. The GM limits cooperation as she sees fit for the circumstances. For instance, if Kelko has been badly wounded, Vor’en Kurn can try a Treat Injury check to keep him from dying. One other character can help Vor’en. If the other hero makes a Treat Injury check against DC 10, then Vor’en gets a +2 bonus on the Treat Injury check he makes to help Kelko. The GM rules that two characters can’t help Vor’en at the same time because a third person would just get in the way. Cooperation may not require all the characters to make the same skill check. If Kelko and Deel Surool try to find information about an illegal business on a Hutt’s datapad, only one can make a Use Computer check. While Kelko is actually checking the datapad, Deel Surool realizes his Knowledge (business) may be able to give hints on what to look for. Deel can make a DC 10 Knowledge (business) check to give Kelko a +2 bonus to his Use Computer check. Ability Checks Somtimes you try to do something to which no specific skill applies. In these cases, you make an ability check; Roll 1d20 and apply the appropriate ability modifier. The GM assigns a DC, or sets up an opposed check when two characters are engaged in a contest using one ability against another. The character who rolls highest acts first. In some cases, a test of one’s ability doesn’t involve luck. Just as you wouldn’t make a height check to see who is taller, you don’t make a Strength check to see who is stronger. When two character’s arm wrestle, for example, the stronger character simply wins. In the case of identical scores, then make opposed Strength checks. List of Skills Acrobatics Climb Deception Endurance Gather Information Initiative Jump Knowledge Mechanics Perception Persuasion Pilot Ride Stealth Survival Swim Treat Injury Use Computer Use the Force